1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a foldable table, and more particularly to a foldable table having a light weight retaining mechanism for supporting the legs without damaging the structural integrity of the tabletop.
2. Description of Related Arts
Foldable tables are useful and convenient for individuals or a group of people in certain occasions. This is particularly true when the occasions are temporarily held in a place of limited space. A foldable table can be folded to minimize its occupying space and to stack as a pile, such that many can be stored in a small room. The foldable tables are of light weight, so that they can be easily carried to another room where they are unfolded for certain purposes. Due to the flexible configuration and light weight, foldable tables are often used for serving food or receiving attendants in a conference or banquet.
Foldable tables are suitable not only for indoor use, but also outdoor activities. A foldable table can be easily loaded in a truck or bigger-sized vehicles and transported to an outdoor place, such as a park and campground. The foldable table can be then erected for various purposes. For example, in a rescue action of emergency, a working table may be needed for placing tools or paper works.
Conventionally, a foldable table includes a tabletop, table legs pivotally attached to the underside of the tabletop, and retaining elements for supporting and maintaining the table legs in an erected manner. The tabletop can be found as in various shapes, such as round, triangle, rectangle and polygonal, among which rectangle is the most-often-seen shape of tabletop. The table legs are so attached to the underside of the tabletop that its mass center falls in the inner area defined by the table legs for keeping the tabletop in balance thereon. The table legs are capable of pivotally moving about the tabletop, such that they may be folded under the tabletop and unfolded to an erected position. The retaining elements have certain mechanism that is able to hold the erected table legs in place and prevent them from folding back causing the tabletop collapsed.
Much attention has been directed to improvement of the retaining elements. One conventional design may be found in U.S. Pat. No. 6,032,585 entitled “Folding Banquet Table,” issued to Daniel R. Pinch on Mar. 7, 2000, wherein a support strut is pivotally attached to a cross member of leg with its one end and sidably mounted to a channel member of the tabletop with its another end, such that the erected leg, support strut and the tabletop constitute a triangle that keeps the erected leg in its position.
A drawback of the above-mentioned type of foldable table is that the channel member may adversely affect the structural integrity of the tabletop. The channel member is mounted to the tabletop by means of bolts or screws drilled into the central portion of its underside. Usually, the central portion of the tabletop is most susceptible to downward deformation, especially for the areas drilled of bolts and screws because of the concentration of stress. Moreover, this type of foldable table requires an additional part, i.e. the channel member, for assembling the support strut, therefore complicating the manufacturing process and incurring an additional cost.
Another conventional design of the retaining element may be found in U.S. Pat. No. 6,112,674 entitled “Portable Folding Utility Table with Center Support Assembly,” issued to Carl R. Stanford on Sep. 5, 2000, wherein a pair of support pedestals are pivotally attached to a frame, through the middle of which a cross-brace member runs, and a pair of pivotal support braces foldably and pivotally connect the cross-brace member and support pedestals, respectively, in order to maintain the support pedestals in an erected position. In this patent, the support pedestals, cross-brace member and pivotal support braces are assembled with the frame as a unit apart from the tabletop, such that the number of bolts and screws sued on the tabletop can be reduced for keeping its structural integrity.
A shortcoming of the above type of foldable table is its heaviness. In order to avoid having bolts and screws drilled on the underside of the tabletop, it adopts a cross-brace member running through the middle of the frame to which the pivotal support brace is pivotally attached. The cross-brace member is made of rigid material to support the weight of the tabletop in the middle portion. Thus, the cross-brace member adds additional weight to the foldable and reduces its mobility.
As such, what is needed is a foldable table that has retaining mechanism adapted for keeping the table legs in an erected position, without substantially adding weight to the foldable table and substantially avoiding adversely affecting the structural integrity of the tabletop.